‘Art, Life, Legacy’ at Milwaukee Art Museum

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Photo: Milwaukee Art Museum

Self-portrait with Skull, Michael Sweerts, 1661

‘Self-portrait with Skull’, Michael Sweerts, 1661

I remember the Saudi foreign minister saying in a news broadcast many years ago, “If we only hadn’t discovered oil, we could be like Japan.” He was referring to the fact that sometimes being resource-wealthy can make one so dependent that they don’t diversify and modernize. The Dutch Republic of the 17th century knew the case well. While the Spanish looted the New World of its shimmering metal, the Dutch were building a network of trade, administration, and civil society that laid the foundations of the modern economy and the subject matter for modern art.

The proto-modern, or maybe proto-proto-modern art of the Dutch is on display in all its awkward and hopeful adolescence in “Art, Life, Legacy: Northern European Paintings in the Collection of Isabel and Alfred Bader,” at the Milwaukee Art Museum through Jan. 28, 2024. The exhibition is a collaboration with Bader’s alma mater Queen’s University and shows us the story of 17th century Northern European art and culture alongside a biography-through-collecting of Alfred Bader, all of which unfurl on top of yet another tale in the form of stories from the Hebrew Bible.

The exhibition is broken into sections reflecting the pillars of Bader’s emotional life: Generosity, Sacrifice, Struggle, Faith, Family, and Journey. His preoccupations were undoubtedly the direct product of Bader’s own biblical journey from his birth in Vienna in 1924 to the United States as a young man, and eventually into a wealthy business owner and philanthropist. Bader had good reason to sympathize with grand historic themes, as it was the combination of sacrifice, struggle, generosity, and faith that underwrote his success. 

Grandeur and Austerity

However, this narrative grandeur meets curiously in the exhibition with the austerity and darkness typical of the Northern Baroque art that became a primary subject of his collecting. A painting like Landscape with Tobias and the Angel, with a View of Antwerp in the Background, strikes the viewer first as a secular landscape painting interested in capturing the flatness and cloud-dense skies of the Lowlands. Other works, such as Cornelius van Poelenburgh’s Saint Christopher and Jan Victor’s Ruth and Noami depict scenes that lead one to mistake them for genre paintings rather than biblical histories. 

This ambiguity is a reflection of Dutch artistic culture in the years following the Reformation, as it retreated from the extravagances, iconography and overtness of the Catholic Church. Over time, as we all know, art would continue to head away from biblical histories, toward human stories, and as it did, it fulfilled its own humanistic prophecy of creating a secular, civil, and ultimately popular society that would supplant the mythologies of the past. 

One can’t help but think about these dueling narratives in relation to Bader’s life. The tension is the soul of the exhibition. In many ways, this show tells us as much about stories as it tells any particular story. The works in many cases aren’t the masterpieces of the era, but rather artifacts that reinforced the self-mythology of the collector. The exception of course is the inclusion of a number of Rembrandts, of whom Bader was a dedicated fan. The artist’s Head of an Old Man in a Cap from 1630 shows us in the space of just 72 square inches why he is part of the pantheon, and why Bader himself couldn’t get enough. 

The show concludes with a section of paintings featuring “Dutch Worlds:” memento mori; tulip still-lifes; a sheep; verdant landscapes; an alchemist.  It leaves one considering the journey on which the world was about to take in the 18th and 19th centuries, leaving the classical world behind. Sociologist Max Weber would eventually describe the stew of characteristics making up this Northern culture as being the well-spring of a modern financial and trade system in his opus The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Ancestry and gold never mattered so much again, and labor, exchange and a new kind of faith won the day. Another fitting story to consider in an exhibition about journeys and the trials and treasures they may present.

Event Listings: October 29 – November 4

Milwaukee Art Museum

• Drop-In Art Making: Kohl’s Art Studio
• Sunday, Oct. 29, 10 a.m.–4 p.m.

Woodland Pattern

• Opening Reception: “Here I am, Standing: New Work by Haerim Lee”
• Sunday, Oct. 29, 1–5 p.m.

Milwaukee Art Museum

• Drop-In Tour: Architecture and Collection Highlights
• Sunday, Oct. 29, 2–3 p.m.

Woodland Pattern

• Haerim Lee, artist talk
• Sunday, Oct. 29, 2 p.m.

Villa Terrace Decorative Arts Museum

• Dia de Los Muertos Celebration
• Sunday, Oct. 29, 1–5 p.m.

Warehouse Art Museum

• Tour of PAUSE/CONNECT with Managing Director, John Shannon
• Wednesday, Nov. 1, 12 p.m.

NO Studios

• Mini Culture Con
• Wednesday, Nov. 1, 4:30–7:30 p.m.

Milwaukee Art Museum

• Group Therapy (LGBTQIA): Black Space at MAM
• Wednesday, Nov. 1, 5:30–7 p.m.

Milwaukee Art Museum

• Gallery Talk: “Darrel Ellis: Regeneration”
• Thursday, Nov. 2, 12–1 p.m.

Charles Allis Art Museum

• "Not Pictured" After Hours Guided Tour with Michael Lagerman
• Thursday, Nov. 2, 6–7 p.m.

Milwaukee Art Museum

• Lecture: “Uncommon Curiosity”
• Thursday, Nov. 2, 6:15–7:15 p.m.

Lily Pad Gallery

• Opening Reception: “Into the Night”
• Friday, Nov. 3, 5–8 p.m.

James May Gallery

• Opening Reception: “Peace of Wild Things: Mark Thompson, Clare Doveton, Debbie Kupinsky & Craig Clifford”
• Friday, Nov. 3, 5–8 p.m.

Museum of Wisconsin Art (MOWA)

• Bloom Weekend
• Friday, Nov. 3–Sunday, Nov. 5, 10 a.m.–5 p.m.

Milwaukee Art Museum

• Kohl’s Art Studio: Celebrating Lois Ehlert
• Saturday, Nov. 4, 10 a.m.–4 p.m.

Milwaukee Art Museum

• Story Time in the Galleries: Celebrating Lois Ehlert
• Saturday, Nov. 4, 10:30–11 a.m.

Milwaukee Art Museum

• Slow Art Saturday
• Saturday, Nov. 4, 10:30–11:30 a.m.

Milwaukee Art Museum

• Drop-In Tour: Architecture and Collection Highlights
• Saturday, Nov. 4, 2–3 p.m.